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Shark diving, waterfall sliding, kava drinking and sea snaking in Fiji

My 2 weeks in Fiji were exciting, beautiful and restorative. Fijians are among the friendliest people I've ever met, and traveling there was an absolute pleasure. This was my first time traveling solo, and I met so many wonderful locals and fellow travelers.

The trip started on Viti Levu, the biggest, most populous and developed island. Though much of it seems quite rural.

Arriving at Club Oceanus in Pacific Harbour, the divemasters immediately plied me with beer and pizza. Clearly these are people who know how to relax.

That evening, my new friend Ash from the resort took me to a big party at Uprising, up the street. The party was a bit frat house, what with its Jim Beam sponsorship, silly dance contests, and heavy Black Eyed Peas rotation. I liked that local people and travelers were mixing it up there, and it had a fun, laid back vibe. A great way to kick off the trip.

The next day I swam in warm water at a local beach, and was joined by about 12 young local boys. They spoke great English (it's required in school), and played Marco Polo with me. They buried an older kid completely in sand, and offered to do the same for me. One boy sang Stevie Wonder songs in a beautiful voice. Several asked to borrow my goggles. Come to think of it, the same thing happened when I swam with local kids in Taganga, Colombia.

 

White water rafting with Rivers Fiji was pretty fabulous (that's me on the left). Driving up a mountain on bumpy roads, our group boarded 4 yellow rubber rafts. A fun little group of Australians was on my raft -- a mom and 2 daughters. Moses, our guide, did an excellent job steering our boat and keeping us safe. Moses and Abraham, another guide, instigated splashing wars, but of course Moses had the advantage in water-related issues.

It was such a gorgeous day out, and the landscape was amazing -- the river had carved deep, curving canyons through the mountain, and lush jungle dripped onto us from atop the steep canyon walls. The whitewater parts were fun, and Moses took us down a few little inlets to swim and splash in small waterfalls. Sometimes we'd float down the river in our life vests. At one point, we got soaked standing under a much larger waterfall. This is one of my favorite kinds of days -- sun, water, adrenaline and fun!

 

The next day, I rode the ziplines at Zip Fiji. The owner drove me there, and it was interesting to hear how he'd applied his airospace engineering skills to building zip line courses around the world. Luckily, my group consisted only of myself and a little boy.

Two guides led us through some rain forest to the first platform, explaining local uses of some of the plants to me. Apparently there's a plant that serves as a fish sedative when you put it in the water, making it easier to fish. And there's even a scuba mask defogger plant!

The platforms and ziplines looked well engineered; each line was actually a double line. I really liked the tour of the forest canopy that the ziplines gave. It was a course of 8 lines, so you could see the landscape change as you went down the mountain.

My final day in Pacific Harbour, I went on a 2 tank shark dive with Aqua Trek. It was pretty fabulous. I've seen and even snuggled sharks while diving before, but never so many at once.

Photo: E. Cheng for Aqua Trek

We all descended to the ocean floor, overweighted so we could sit comfortably and not drift. 12 feet away, divemasters with chainmail gloves removed tuna heads from garbage cans, and the sharks began to swarm and feed from their hands.

Photo: Pete Atkinson

There were black tip, white tip, silver tip, nurse, lemon, and my favorite, the bull shark! I'd seen all the others, but hadn't seen bulls before; in addition to being long, up to 11', they are quite wide and stout. A couple swam over my head. There may have been 20-30 sharks circling and feeding. Giant trevally, jacks, snappers, and other fish joined the fray -- there were hundreds of fish in the frenzy. At one point, Sammy the divemaster came over to give me a beautiful bull shark tooth. After the activity died down we swam around a boat wreck for a few minutes.

While in Pacific Harbour, I met some interesting independent travelers, including a couple guys sailing around the world. One night, I tried kava, along with a couple fellow travelers and the locals who made it for us.

 

It's crazy how many cane toads there are on Viti Levu. They're an invasive species, and come out like a biblical plague when it rains.

My last evening in Pacific Harbour, some of my new friends from Club Oceanus took me out drinking to say farewell.

Early the next morning, I cabbed it to Suva, Fiji's biggest city, for my flight to Taveuni the "Garden Island." The airport cafe had some delicious Indian sausage rolls -- something I haven't tried before.

On Taveuni, I stayed at the lovely Coconut Grove resort, a small bed and breakfast with 3 guest bures (the name for a freestanding native home), and guest room in the main house (where I stayed).

Ronna, the proprietor, and her sweet staff made it such a fun, comfortable stay.

The ladies at Coconut Grove made lovely food; I enjoyed it the whole time I was there. One favorite item was a sweet and spicy papaya soup.

Cats Popsickle and Creamsickle, and Millie the dog demanded daily belly rubs. Coconut Grove felt very homey.

And Taveuni was incredibly beautiful, green and natural.

Though Taveuni's population is quite small, there were many churches of different denominations, mosques, and Hindu temples.

 

Soccer and rugby are super popular in Fiji.

You can walk from today into tomorrow on Taveuni, as it's on the international dateline.

This woman showed me her sewing shop, and accompanied me to the store to buy a sarong.

The local fire brigade did their practice exercises for a crowd.

I enjoyed the samosa shop's marijuana PSA poster.

It was fun sliding down natural waterslides made of eroded rock with the local kids.

I dove for a couple of days on Taveuni's Rainbow Reef with Taveuni Dive, but didn't bother with a camera this time. The coral was gorgeous and barroque; endless shapes and colors of coral were piled atop each other, and all the requisite tropical fish.

 

Photos: Dominic Toledo

I especially enjoyed seeing a very large octopus, a couple unusual shrimp and lobsters, and some nudibranches. At one point, dolphins frolicked off the bow of our boat.

Another day I went on the Lavena Coastal Walk, a very well-built and groomed tropical rain forest trail by the sea. The plants, mountains, coast and waterfalls were gorgeous. Swimming in waterfall-fed ponds was delicious, as was sliding down a 12 foot waterfall into a lagoon.

That night I stayed at a lodge next to a traditional village. I joined Ken, a marine biologist, and his group in giving kava to the village chief. This is a traditional way to ask permission to stay in a village. We walked through the village, took off our shoes, and entered a home where all the belongings seemed to hang from the rafters.

The experience of sitting on the floor in the chief's dark room, as our greeting was translated, and our gift proffered to the chief was very powerful and special.

Later that evening, dinner was cooked by the local women, and included fish in coconut milk, taro, taro leaves (like spinach). Delicious. 

Afterward, Ken invited me to go "sea snaking" with his group. He's an expert on sea snakes, and was counting the population along the shore. Shining flashlights, we waded around a rocky outcropping. The snakes can breathe air and water, and nest in holes at night on the shore. After a long search, a snake was found.

One of his students carefully unearthed it from its hole, and I was able to hold the it! What a thrill. It was beautiful with dark blue and white banding, and a distinctive paddle-like tail. Sea snakes can be 20 times more venomous than land snakes, but I felt comfortable that the people around me were experts. I'm so grateful for this unique experience of seeing one up close.

It was so great to see the more developed (Viti Levu) and less developed (Taveuni) sides of Fiji in one trip. I hope to return and see my Fijian friends one day.

Ugly Overload!

Yeah! One of my pictures made Ugly Overload today. Check it out. Or read the original post.

Profiteroles and Palm Trees

We landed in Tahiti by night, and the air was pleasantly balmy. The owner of the pension picked us up, and later gave us some delicious buttery cake. A huge advantage of traveling in Francophone countries is that they know their bread and pastries.

The next day was unseasonably cloudy; we walked around Pipette all afternoon. There's not a lot going on in Pipette.

Lunch was delicious (and expensive) at a place called Zinc. Black pearls were being sold all over town. After cocktails at an open-air Chinese restaurant, we had dinner at an unlikely place: a French brewpub that makes its own special "tarts" -- flaky crusted pizza with distinctive toppings. The waiter joked, "It's better because it's French." It was.

Tahiti´s local brew...

The next day, after a short ferry ride to the island of Moorea, we took a local bus to our ocean-side pension. Moorea is smaller than Tahiti, and looks wilder and more mountainous. It basically consists of steep, jagged, volcanic mountaintops jutting out of the sea -- the platonic ideal of a Polynesian island. People only live at the bottom edge.

Our little hut was several feet from the water. Moorea is surrounded by a coral reef, which creates lovely, calm, coral-filled lagoons. We snorkeled several feet from our bungalow, and saw two octopi, a Lionfish, a Pipefish, and lots of other animals. It was better than some dives we've had.

Diving with a local shop, the coral off Moorea looked like a pristine garden of dimpled umbrella-shaped coral heads. On the first dive, we saw several Black-Tipped and Lemon sharks. But the highlight was a sleeping Nurse shark -- an eight-footer slumbering with its head under some coral. It was amazing to be within a foot of this creature.

A friendly Hawksbill turtle named Jeannine came to see us several times. Once, I swam through a current, right next to her. Later, the dive-master helped us feed her some sponge.

Assorted Morray Eels, Lionfish, Porcupine Fish, octopus, Pufferfish, Titan, Orange-line and Picasso Triggerfish, and many others were seen.

Moorea diving seems to be about (relatively) clear, warm waters, and mega-fauna. There aren't many Nudibranches there.

A later snorkeling expedition revealed a large eel and lots of Pipefish.

One night, watching the sunset from the porch, I saw a couple longboats go by, rowed by chanting men.

We enjoyed playing with this kitten at the pension.

No account of French Poly is complete without one of these photos:

On our last day, we took a tour, and saw lots of Black-tipped Sharks and, later, stingrays. The stingrays swarmed the tour group, searching for food, and felt very slippery and flexible. Lunch was an excellent barbecue on a small island. A bizarre number of chickens (forty?) and five cats showed up for a handout. A chicken drank from a cup of rum punch. We snorkeled near the island a while. Rays came near the shore of the island; being flattish, they can swim in just several inches of water.

French Polynesia left me with some new impressions, though our stay was short. It has a reputation for being unfriendly, but we had only positive experiences. We enjoyed the meshing of French and Polynesian culture and cuisine. Somehow this sign for web design and sight administration seemed particularly French to me.

And it surprised us to see how small the tourism infrastructure was on the islands, given that the islands have been a famous vacation spot for so long. This is a great thing for a traveler who likes a (relatively) less commercial experience, but probably makes it hard for the local economy to thrive. A positive aspect of the limited tourism infrastructure is that French Poly seems very livable for locals. It´s not completely overrun with tourists, and many businesses are aimed at the local market -- the locals seem to continue to "own" their public spaces, unlike some more commercial places we´ve visited. Though I didn´t stay at Le Meridien, and the feeling might be different at that kind of venue.

Diving the Great Barrier Reef

In Cairns, on the northeast coast of Australia, we made our first dive-related purchase -- masks and snorkels. Mine are in white, and make me think of A Clockwork Orange somehow. We also attended a "Reef Teach" lecture on the flora and fauna of the reef, taught by the bizarrely theatrical, yet incredibly informative Paddy.

The next day, we boarded a Pro-Dive live-aboard dive boat for a three day adventure on the Great Barrier Reef. The boat was very comfortable, and with a good set of people.

The three hour ride to the reef was incredibly choppy, and most were feeling queasy on arrival.

While at the reef, Jason and I did our first unguided dives together, some more successful than others. We saw some interesting fish, yet the reef seemed rather dead in some areas. We also tried night diving for the first time, and really enjoyed the feeling of floating in outer space. Many large red cod were out at night.

On one particularly good dive, we saw several large sea turtles. One of our fellow divers, Donald Cantlon, took this and all the other underwater shots in this post:

There were multiple types of Clown-fish (Nemo) on the reef.

Lion-Fish (or Scorpion-Fish) were well camouflaged.

At one point, Jason and I were trying to navigate around a big coral formation and find the "swim through" to get back to the boat. We didn't find it, and figured we'd swim over the top of the formation. Unfortunately, the flattish top of the coral was quite broad, and was only about three feet away from the roiling surface of the sea. We were churned around up there, and struggled to get back to the boat. It was exhausting. After a struggle, we finally cleared the coral. Now we know why it's called a swim through. Not to be repeated.

We purchased a slate on the boat for the next dive. A slate is a tablet you can write on underwater. We figured this would help us communicate better. Our first underwater "conversation" was something highly streamlined like,

"Where boat?"

"Maybe that way -->"

"But are you sure we passed this coral?"

"Compass says that way."

"You sure?"

"Think so."

etc.

We spotted a few nudibranches (tiny colorful slugs), a sign we were improving -- diving slowly and observantly.

There were a few rays in the reefs too.

Journey to the Red Center 5: Brick Beehives

After getting up at a leisurely 6am, we cleared out.

We stopped at Kings Canyon for the last hike of the trip. It another day of beautiful scenery in the desert. Muscular rounded rock formations look like brick domes or beehives.

And there's an oasis; a deep, rugged gorge cut by a stream, filled with plant life.

Cycads, an ancient form of palm tree from the dinosaur days, thrive there -- some are a thousand years old, but they look like they could have grown in a year to my eye. The little valley of green is a rarity in the harsh, dry bush.

You can see layers of stone from the ice age(s) on massive sliced cliff-sides.

We saw some parrots near our lunch site.

After stretching our legs, we got back on the bus for several hours. We stopped at the giant echidna roadhouse again, where I saw this emu resting.

Then we drove several hours to Alice Springs, the end-point of our outback adventure. That night, the group had one last dinner together.

Journey to the Red Center 4: Amazing Uluru

The next morning, we got up at 4am again. Oy. We hopped in the bus for a really long drive to Uluru (Ayer's Rock).

Stopping for sunrise at the Painted Desert, we were at the edge of the old inland sea, which dried out eons ago.

Not too far along, we stopped at the "Dog Fence," an incredibly long north to south fence to keep dingos out of sheep farming country.

Dingos on the right, sheep on the left. I think it goes through most of the country. Oz seems full of quirky, quaint old stuff that seems out of the past, but is actually still holding things together.

Stopping at a roadhouse later, we saw our first "big things." Australia, like the U.S., has a tradition of building out-sized objects get your attention at service stations or small towns. There are big crabs, rocking chairs, koalas, coffee pots, avocados, worms. And of course, there is a big echidna.

Of all the big things to see, this was the perfect one for me, as I'm fond of the hedgehog, which bears a resemblance to the echidna. But, unlike the hedgehog, it is a monotreme.

After hours in the bus, watching relentless scrubby flat landscape, with occasional giant Wedgetail Eagles perched on dead trees, we stopped for firewood. The local, scrubby gum trees die in their teen years, so there are plenty of dead ones. We got to feel macho hauling big trees to the van.

Finally, in the evening light, we saw Uluru! Well, actually, it was Fooluru -- there's a plateau nearby that resembles the rock from an angle, and most on the bus were fooled. Not me.

After another hour or so, finally, we glimpsed the rock. It was purple, blue and red against the evening sky, and looked like an incredibly grand loaf of bread.

What makes Uluru so amazing is that you've been driving through hundreds of miles of (beautiful) nothingness, then suddenly, here's the world's biggest rock, dark red and monolithic. We watched Uluru change color in the sunset.

The rock is sacred to Aboriginal people, and has been returned to their jurisdiction. They have many stories and ceremonies involving Uluru, which they still practice. Aboriginals are one of the world's oldest cultures, and have been on the Australian continent for at least 60,000 years. They have been doing same dot drawings, eating the same bush-tucker, performing the same dances for eons. They remember the ice age. It boggles.

That night, we camped at a site near the rock. We slept in Australian swags, which are comprised of a thin mattress and canvas outer layer. You put a sleeping bag in, and pull the swag's flap over your head to sleep. The combination of a cold night, swagging it, and getting up at 4 again did not result in the best of morning moods.

We went to a lookout point to watch Uluru in the first light.

After sunrise, we took an 8km walk around the rock. It was a coldish, windy morning.

From far away, Uluru looks monolithic. Up close, you realize that pockmark you saw is actually a large cave. Swooping, ribbed, undulating, striated, perforated, etched forms reveal themselves as you view the rock up close.

There's even a sort of inlet with a freshwater spring.

Aborigines painted lessons in some of the caves. They perform sacred ceremonies around other features, but tourists aren't allowed to photograph those.

That afternoon, the flies were out en mass.

We visited Kata Tjuta (The Olgas), a sacred site of Aboriginal men (Aboriginal women aren't allowed there, but have their own sacred sites).

Unlike Uluru, which is mostly granite, they're formed from composite rock. They're stunning forms, like tall cakes about to topple. Perhaps I was craving bread that day. They were carved by erosion, with really unique, generally pointy, light green vegetation growing at their bases.

We hiked through a stunning wedge-shaped valley between two of the rocks that made us feel very small.

It was like walking through a mammoth Richard Serra sculpture.

Fly-nets were the order of the day.

We drove back to the firewood spot, and gathered some more for that evening. That afternoon, another monster bus ride contributed to a rigor mortis-like feeling.

After dark, we arrived at our "bush camp," in an isolated part of Western Australia, after driving through some scrubby country on a twisty dirt road. It was a very nice, clean campground.

We all helped make a satisfying chicken stew and mashed potatoes, then sat by a big bonfire, created with our firewood. Things were more subdued than the previous night, as people had run out of booze. I found a really long stick and we roasted some marshmallows. Some in the international group had never eaten marshmallows and this was their first taste.

We swagged it again, but it wasn't as cold that evening. There was a rock under my swag.

Journey to the red center 3: Coober Pedy, Underground City!

After rising (painfully) at 4am, we started the long drive to Coober Pedy, an opal-mining town. I laid down across some seats on the bus, with our water and juice bottles under my head. After a couple hours of comfortably sprawling, I noticed my jacket was a little wet. And my shirt and sweater were too. Then I made the unpleasant discovery a bottle of juice had leaked, and about a glass full of juice had soaked into my shirt, sweater, jacket and pants. The next few hours were less pleasant.

The landscape flattened out as we drove, with forests turning to scrubby trees and bushes. The dirt was looking redder than before too.

A trucker greeted me over coffee at a roadhouse. A grandmotherly woman said g'day at another truck stop's restroom. Aussies are so friendly.

The barren landscape with service stations in the middle of nowhere reminded me of parts of the U.S.

It was sunny and pleasantly cool out, a relief from the cool, wet weather of Melbourne.

Coober Pedy is one of the coolest quirkiest places I've been. I wish we'd had more time there. As a kid, I'd seen a TV program about it -- I think it was "Real People" -- and had wanted to see it ever since.

Basically, it's an opal-mining town in the middle of nowhere; isolated and in the desert. What makes this town unusual is that the area is mined by individual miners and small companies, rather than big mining companies. So there are lots of individual miners there, trying to make it big.

Also, when these miners were digging, they realized the mines were cooler than the outside air, and began digging cave homes for themselves. As a result, many of the homes and businesses in the town are underground, dug out of the soft limestone, Flintstones-style. You can see ventilation pipes sticking out all over town. This underground architecture is the most famous feature of Coober Pedy. In fact, the name Coober Pedy means "White Man Burrows" in an Aboriginal language.

On arriving, we took a tour of an old opal mine, and learned about the mining, cutting and finishing process. The local opals are beautiful; much fierier than European ones.

Then we got to see the inside of someones home, which looked as though it had been hermetically sealed in the '60s. But someone does live there now. It was amazing.

Then, the nice lady showed us how to make a dynamite bomb.

We took a short tour of the town as well, including the local underground Catholic church. The pastor's sermon is delivered by radio to those too far away to attend in person.

 

The underground homes and churches of course reminded us of ancient ones in Kappadokya, Turkey.

The School of the Air is located in Coober Pedy too. It's a radio-based school for the hundred-some students living in the desolate surrounding area -- an area larger than France.

That evening, we had some pizza at a restaurant run by Greeks; the town is incredibly diverse, as people come from all over the world to try their luck at mining. As a side note, Australia has a huge amount of gambling with "pokies," slot machines, in many pubs all over the country. Coober Pedy seemed to us like a town full of pokies players, with everyone trying to make it big.

We stayed in a cave hotel that night; the second cave hotel in less than a year; the first having been in Kappadokya. Our room looked like a normal, if somewhat '70s, hotel room that happened to have carved stone walls. The temperature was cool and constant. I love cave dwellings.

... And there was a laundry facility to wash out the juice.

Journey to the Red Center 2: Emus, Roos and Slag Heaps

Driving out of town the next day, we saw lots of emus, kangaroos, wild black sheep, Scottish sheep, and garden-variety white sheep. It's amazingly easy to see mega-fauna in the bush.

I picked up a quondong pie at another little town. They call the quondong the "desert peach," though I don't think they're related. Nearby, we saw the cutest cottage in the outback.

We stopped to look at a slag heap, as one does.

Nearby were beautiful old rusty tanks. Not sure what they were for. Perhaps they were used in the manufacture of, um, slag.

Then, we hiked a little through the "Pound," a ring of mountains and their valley. In the old days, farmers kept horses in the Pound, as they were unable to walk out.

After a lunch of hamburgers at the campground grill, we drove through a few other little towns, and finally to a sheep station, our destination for the night.

Our guide, Firie, and some Korean backpackers from our bus made green curry for dinner.

Firie is a sort of archetypal Aussie; a beefy guy with a good sense of humor. And a former fireman, hence the name. Many times throughout the journey, he played a raucous Aussie folk song on the bus, with the chorus of "G'day, g'day. And how ya goin? Whad'ya know? And strike a light," etc. By the end of the trip, we were all sayng "G'day," which was, apparently, the goal.

Journey to the Red Center 1: Panoramas and Fly Nets

We began another "adventure" bus trip -- this time a week-long journey from Adelaide to Uluru (Ayer's Rock) and Alice Springs, visiting many points in between. Our group was a range of ages and nationalities.

The first day, we saw the (fairly) green and fertile landscape of Adelaide change to scrubby desert. The soil near Adelaide supports vineyards and sheep. The land near Parachilna, our overnight stop, can barely support sheep. And with the desert came some warmth, as well as really annoying flies that persistently land on your lips and eyes.

We enjoyed seeing old European-style brick homes in the tiny desert towns. Most were built by immigrants imitating the architectural styles of their native lands. As a result, many were climatically inappropriate, and people had to add verandas to stay cool.

In a little town called Melrose, we walked to a park, and saw two smallish kangaroos grazing. We were able to pet them. They felt soft and downy.

After kangaroo-petting and really fab gelato, we concurred, Melrose did indeed have "much to offer."

At one point, we climbed a rock formation to see some Aboriginal cave paintings.

In Hawker, another little berg, we saw the "Wilpena Panorama," part of the Jeff Morgan Gallery, "undertaken to try and capture the glory of God's wonderful Creation."

A panorama is  usually a cylindrical room containing continuous, panoramic painting of a landscape. In this case it was a depiction of the beautiful local mountains. There was a viewing platform in the middle of the room, and the room echoed when we stood there.

I think most panoramas were painted in the 19th century. I them particularly interesting in the way they corresponded to (then) changing ideas of nature, God, people's ability to "control" nature, manifest destiny etc.

The landscape got pretty flat after that.

Although, somehow, the kangaroos managed to ski.

We were shown the remains of the oldest homestead in the area, which was built in the 19th century. Although it was quite recent, life on the homestead was brutal. As evidenced by the "hut."

That evening, we had our first outback beer at Parachilna.

Watching the sunset with an Ozzie beer (or, in my case, a cocktail), the flies swarmed our faces with unexpected tenacity. They go for the protein in your eyes. This led to the donning of ridiculous-looking bush hats with attached nets (photos later).

There was "bush tucker" for dinner, as Steve Irwin would say -- kangaroo steaks.

That night, we stayed at the charming Parachilna hotel, built in the 19th century, and enjoyed the luxury of a bathtub.

Adelaide

We stayed in Adelaide a couple extra days, so I could get over the cold bug. At a million plus residents, Adelaide feels like a really big town or a really small city. We both had really nice massages by a bearish Bavarian guy. Otherwise, we didn't get out much, as I was mainlining chicken soup and juice. So, unfortunately, there isn't much of an entry for Adelaide.